Helen Thorpe

Just Like Us is the story of four high school students whose parents entered this country illegally from Mexico. All four of the girls have grown up in the United States, all four want to live the American dream, only two have documents. As the girls attempt to make it into college, they discover that only the legal pair see a clear path forward. A coming-of-age story about girlhood,friendship, as well as the resilience required to transcend poverty,...

Follows the lives of twenty-two immigrant teenagers from nations devastated by drought or famine or war, over the course of their first school year in America. The talented and endlessly resourceful Denver South High School teacher Mr. Eddie Williams welcomes these students, who speak fourteen different languages but no English and are completely unfamiliar with American culture, to his specially created English Language Acquisition class. He guides...

Offering a nuanced and transformative take on immigration, multiculturalism, and America's role on the global stage, The Newcomers follows and reflects on the lives of twenty-two immigrant teenagers throughout the course of their 2015-2016 school year at Denver's South High School. Unfamiliar with American culture or the English language, the students range from the age of fourteen to nineteen and come from nations struggling with drought, famine,...

The Newcomers follows the lives of twenty-two immigrant teenagers throughout the course of the 2015-2016 school year as they land at South High School in Denver, Colorado. These newcomers, from fourteen to nineteen years old, come from nations convulsed by drought or famine or war. Many come directly from refugee camps, after experiencing dire forms of cataclysm. Some arrive alone, having left or lost every other member of their original family. At...